


What The Hell Am I?

by convolutedConcussion



Series: This Could Be Okay [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: I Just Wanted Hugs, M/M, Post-Winter Soldier, Reunion Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-22
Updated: 2014-04-22
Packaged: 2018-01-20 09:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1504718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/convolutedConcussion/pseuds/convolutedConcussion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The everyday things keep Steve grounded.  The smell of fresh plaster and paint.  The noises of the inhabitants of his apartment building around him.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>It's just a really self-indulgent, very cliche piece.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What The Hell Am I?

**Author's Note:**

> I only just saw Winter Soldier today. So, really, this is so self-indulgent, and I'm sure it's been written a thousand times by now, and I'm really okay with that. It was just a way of drawing out the poison of my own wounded heart.
> 
> There are a lot of things I want to say about Bucky, and about Steve. About all of them, really. But tonight? I just needed to write/post this.
> 
> Forgive me, though, if this really has been written a thousand times and for any mistakes or slips in tense. I literally wrote this, didn't proofread, and posted. I'm so, so sorry.

Everything's nearly back in order in his apartment—walls put back together, new furniture, blood cleaned up. Everything smells like paint and plaster and a lot of stuff had to be thrown away, almost all of his books are gone, but that's okay. He can replace them. It's not quiet, and that helps. Downstairs, the Peterson kids are screaming; upstairs, Marianne Lebowitz is playing rock music too loud. Sometimes, those little things, those little reminders that people around him are going on with their lives, reassure him. Life goes on.

He's waiting on take-out—food fit to feed many, would have fed his family way-back-when for a week, barely enough to keep up with his metabolism—cross-legged on the spare “modern” couch the girl at the store picked out for him with one of the books that made it open on his knee. His eyes skim the same three lines minute after minute after minute.

A month. A month he's been tracking...

Steve doesn't give up. He _won't_ give up. He just isn't entirely sure where to go from here. His mind keeps going back to that day, to wide eyes, to falling.

To drowning.

To being alive.

There's a knock and Steve swallows dryly. He stands and yells, “Hold on a minute.” Snagging the cash he'd set aside and yanks the door open, saying, “Thanks, man, that was quick, I--”

And he doesn't quite believe it right at first. He's sleeping, or he's driving himself crazy after reading and rereading and staring at that  _damn_ picture and--

It's him, though. It's gotta be him. He's got five-day-shadow and he looks like he hasn't slept in about a month, hair pulled back but all in knots. His hoodie is dirty and his jeans are loose, shoulders are all hunched in and fists balled in pockets, and for all that there's barely a glimmer of feeling in his eyes. (But Steve searches and searches and latches on to that feeling because that's important, it's  _so_ important.)

For weeks, he planned the moment he'd see Bucky. He knew all the things he'd say. Knew what he wanted to ask and, more importantly, what he couldn't. He went back and forth between wanting to slug the guy and hug him. He didn't know how he'd find him, or in what state, and each possibility rendered a different reaction and he had them all thought out—but this?

He did not account for this.

It occurs to him that they've been standing like this for several minutes when the other man opens his mouth, looking somewhere in the region of Steve's left shoulder. “I—I'm—I know... I know who you are,” he mumbles through tight teeth. “I forgot. Made me—they made me forget. 'n' I... forget who I am. But you...” Yanking a hand—the flesh-and-bone hand—out of his pocket, he rakes his fingers through his dirty, tangled hair and hisses. Gasping and eyes darting frantically, his voice creaks, as if to himself, “I don't know what I  _am.”_

But then his eyes focus back on Steve. His expression clears, breathing slows. His brow knits. “Steve Rogers,” he whispers faintly. “I read... about us, about Bucky, too.”

There's a spike of pain in his hand and a sharp creak and Steve's eyes flash to where he's white-knuckling the door and has to make a concerted effort not to break the wood. He lets go. He feels Bucky shift ever so slightly.  _“You're_ Bucky,” he manages, still staring at the door.

The guy's nodding a little unsteadily when he looks back over, replying, “Sometimes I—I think that, think I must be. I think I remember, but...” He trails off, small and helpless like he's not capable of bringing down the entire building around them. His mouth twists, an unhappy smile. “S-someone, this kid, recognized me at—at the Smithsonian—she didn't say anything I... thought she would but,” he swallows and Steve hears his throat click. “She smiled.”

Though there are about a dozen alarms pinging in his head telling him  _not_ to do what he's about to do, Steve's arm lifts and he grasps Bucky's shoulder. Through layers, he feels that he's too-warm, sweaty, tense. He fears for a moment that it's too much, that he'll disappear again, but Bucky doesn't run, doesn't even flinch. Glassy-eyed, he sways a little and lets his chin fall to his chest and Steve sees something in that gesture, sees his old friend who hated being comforted even though he had had just as much to be comforted over as he himself at some points—and Steve's pushing it, really truly pushing all rational boundaries but he almost can't help himself when he drags Bucky (who isn't the old Bucky but he's not the old Steve and times change and maybe Bucky can be okay some day) to his chest.

For a moment, nothing happens and dread more terrible than any he's ever felt before wraps cold and tight around his lungs and he feels the gulf between them swell.

But then Bucky makes a noise, deep in his chest and too broken to be a sob and that's it, all the floodgates are flung open and they're clinging to one another and Bucky  _reeks_ but Steve just holds him closer, buries his face into his shoulder, crushes him tight and doesn't complain that he's getting a little too much action from that robotic arm because it's okay, it's okay, it's okay. He's mumbling nonsense and he's got dirty hair in his mouth but it's okay, it's all okay.

And his eyes burn and he doesn't know if the tension in his heart his fear or overwhelming happiness—can't tell what he's feeling because he's feeling the other man shake apart in his arms, listening to his quick breathing and confusing whose is whose and where they are and, god,  _Bucky_ , he came back, he's here, he searched for a month but he's  _here_ , and--

“Um, Mr. Rogers? I've got your take-out?”

 


End file.
